The Soul Puller
by ImNaturallySuper
Summary: In the secret shadows of this world, you can find monsters around ever corner. But of all the things that go bump in the night, I'm beginning to wonder if I'm the worst.
1. The Soul Puller

_F__ear is not real, it is a product of thoughts you create. _

Someone really smart told me that once.

I am not normal, never was. But just when I thought I could get on with the curse life had pitched at me, fate threw me another curve ball in the form of Dean Winchester.

And seconds after we touched for the first time I realized I'd never be normal again.

The first time I remember my soul leaving my body was when I was fourteen. And although I didn't know it yet, there was reasoning beyond what my mind and body were capable of putting faith in.

One moment I was sleeping. The next I was standing outside my bedroom door as my body laid behind on the bed. The first rational thought that sprang to my mind was that it was a dream.

But looking back I knew that explanation didn't fit. I don't dream. I never have. Sleep for me is peaceful. Silent.

My body didn't appear to be moving, or even breathing. I had to look away. All I expected to feel never came to me. I was numb to fear.

Every step was as if I weighed nothing at all. Every movement loose and uncaptivating. Everything was conceivable, everything was weightless.

At that moment when the world held my body at bay, I finally felt free. The only thing I could think of was to run, so I did. I moved my limbs faster into the night as if the world was at my heels chasing me down. I ran into the woods, floating on and on as if every leap I took wouldn't return me to Earth. I didn't want to go back, if this was real or if it was a dream I didn't care. Every single piece of me belonged to the air, was solid with the Earth, as it had never been before. I could fly if I tried.

So I ran faster. In the next instant I felt a harsh pressure at my back. At first it was soft, it could have been my imagination for all I knew. Then it turned almost painful. Unexpectedly my stomach flipped on its side and I could feel my lungs burning for breath. I sat up in bed pressing my cold hands against the agonizing beat of the heart in my chest. It felt foreign, as if it belonged to someone else.

I closed my eyes and cried. I still can barely remember the moment my soul returned. It happened faster than flight. But the only way I can explain it, is that it's like being caged. Confined inside yourself so deep there is no hope for escape.

I never quite escaped again after that.

People don't really know what a burden bodies can be, they can imagine it sure, but the feeling of it will never compare to the mind's creation. Imagine being that free, that light, never feeling the weight of your heart against your ribs, never having to sleep, never being tired or sick, never wanting for anything. Just being outside of everything that pushes you into yourself, being truly free.

Then have that ripped away from you in one painful second. I remember it clearly each time now. Every time I leave my body it hurts more and more to return.

But I didn't try and stop it. I couldn't. The power was addictive, and I was insatiable.

But despite the urges to roam I convinced myself I was in control. Hope is a tricky thing though, it can strengthen as well as kill.

The day I pulled someone's soul other than mine, I decided to pack my bags and never turn back to my old life. My Dad didn't say a word, I think he knew why I left. My best friend begged me not to go. She never knew at all.

I thought so many times of telling people that came and went from my life about what I could do. But after March 13th of the year I turned twenty-one the part of me that froze when I had tried to talk about it roared up inside of me. It knew so well, even before I did, of what I was capable of.

I hate to think of what that day turned me into. But there is no point in lying to myself. I know I killed him.

His name was Dean Winchester, born January 24th 1979, survived by his loving brother Sam Winchester. I read that in the obituary section two weeks after I left town. He was in a coma for a whole week before his organs finally gave up and failed. I suppose his actual body died a horrible death, suffocating slowing without its soul. Just withering away.

But then again he never really died. He's still out there somewhere, wandering around, getting lost through time, probably not even knowing he is dead. Maybe he thinks he's just dreaming.

I can still remember the look on his face the very moment it happened. I wonder now if I ever looked like that. It's weird that I never even knew his name, but the moment we touched I could feel everything he did. I knew his thoughts, his fears, I connected to him in a way no two people ever could in mortal bodies alone.

We share our thoughts with other people but we portray them the way we want them to be heard, not how they really sound inside our minds. We grasp at each other searching for just a moment of peace in each others arms, but it's just bodies colliding.

It all means nothing.

His name was a label someone had given him, and I don't even know why I cared to know it. But I did.

Maybe I had known him in his last seconds deeper than anyone had ever known him and a part of me needed to put a name to the soul I had abandoned. I can still feel him at the tips of my fingers, straining against my hands.

For a time I had no idea where he ended and I began.

I closed my eyes when he passed through me yet I still saw him.

I _knew_ him. Hell, for a moment in time I _was_ him.

When his body collapsed to the sidewalk I did the first thing that came to mind. The only thing I could do.

I ran like a coward.

I never knew why it happened, there was nothing specific about the way we touched, it was a casual passing on the street. A quick bump we shared, an "Oh, excuse me!" soon to be on my lips. Still for some reason his soul touched my fingers and just wouldn't let go. Maybe he wanted to go. Maybe it was meant to be.

Maybe, maybe, _maybe_.

I hate that word now, it is everything that could be, yet it isn't anything at all. No answers come from the word maybe, just more questions.

A part of me used to believe that I was the only one in the world that could do what I do. Now I know how ridiculously naive it is to think that way.

I couldn't be the only soul puller. Lost souls are everywhere.

And if you have never believed in ghosts before I suppose now is a good time to start.

I should know firsthand. Because I help make them.


	2. I Can Feel You

I watched the tracks I left in the dirt, wondering momentarily how fast they'd be erased. This was my out, and I'd taken it. Not that I'd had many people to say goodbye to.

My father hadn't even bat an eyelash at my retreating form. Did he know? How could he have? Yet the alternative was too much to take. Maybe he just didn't care.

I glanced at my cell phone, longing for it to ring. The one time it had I had prayed it was my best friend Alli.

It wasn't. It was a wrong number.

I guess I had pretty much ruined any chance of her forgiving me with my parting speech. I couldn't even drudge up enough guilt right now to care.

The sun beat down incessantly. Ninety-five degrees. Yet no humidity in sight. I wrinkled my nose at the thought, I was probably turning into a raisin from the inside out. Summer in Kansas this time of year should've rained humidity down upon us. I should be breaking a major sweat. Yet only a few small drops clung to my brow and at the base of my neck.

I swatted at them every few moments.

The train tracks under my feet slowly started to rise out of the mounds of dirt once engulfing them. I smiled wryly at the odd feeling of traction under my converse.

"This way to Hell, Carrow. You're on the right track." I muttered to myself.

I talk to myself. It's not an endearing quality I am told. My best friend, well, my ex-best friend would roll her eyes on repeat every time I replied, "Oh, nothing." To her asking me, "What did you say?"

Come to think of it she spent a lot of time rolling her eyes at me.

When the small store ahead rose up out of the waves of heat like an oasis I didn't know if I should let myself stop or keep going in penance.

It'd been a solid six weeks since I'd killed a man, felt his soul rip from his body and didn't even try to stop it. Six weeks of torment. The first two were spent in denial, the next contemplating death.

Feeling the cold muzzle of a gun pressed to your temple does things to your mind, clears it of anything foolish and forces you to face reality in the most raw ways.

It wasn't that I thought I didn't deserve to pull the trigger when I'd put the gun down. It was that I knew that was too easy a punishment for myself. I deserved to suffered. The way he did.

_Dean Winchester._ Even inside my own head the sound of it was horrible. I looked about as if a crowd would form, whispering his name as they dragged me away.

The worst part hadn't started showing up until week five. When bits of his memory had started surfacing inside me. First within dreams. Then flashes started plaguing my waking life too.

Packing all I owned in a small backpack, once I knew I didn't deserve anything, was easy. Saying goodbye to a life I never let myself get invested in, even more simple.

You never really learn how much you had until you let yourself come to terms with never seeing it again. But I'd give it all up, spend an eternity in Hell, just to find a way to get his soul back.

"And do what with it?" I mocked myself. His body was gone. Dead and buried.

I hadn't allowed myself the grief, yet it swam off shore in my mind, waiting for a chance to sneak up and drown me. Dean Winchester was dead, body six feet under, and it was my fault.

I had his eyes plastered to inside of my eyelids. It's why I never slept. Whenever I closed mine I was forever gazing into his. Green depths swallowing me whole. Blaming me.

I never needed to sleep again. Daylight swaddled me, scorching my throat with its heat and scratching my corneas with each grain of sand I kicked up.

Step after step. It never ended.

I didn't know where I was going. I didn't need to. My destination wasn't on this plane. I could only hope someone took pity on me and ended me soon. I couldn't do it myself, I was equal parts sadistic and equal parts weak. I wanted to die, but selfishly wished for it to happen at an others hands.

When my phone finally rang I was well past the gas station I hadn't let myself enter. Water? Who needs water in this heat?

I fumbled with the buttons, pushing more than one before getting the send button on the fourth try.

"Yes?" I croaked into the receiver.

"Stop walking." The voice sounded muffled, as if it was coming across a universe of static.

I squinted into nothing as my feet obeyed the odd command. "Who is this?"

"I think you should know. You killed me after all." My heart lurched at the words. But I didn't have time to respond before his face stenciled into the space in front of me, ratcheting off the heat waves like an electric current.

I dropped the phone in the sand at my feet. Dean's figure rippled again before settling on a solid form.

My eyes widened on his and I could tell instantly that he was surprised I could see him.

"Finally." He said, his voice rough and a bit angry. "I have been screaming at you for what felt like years."

I felt my mouth moving but no sound came out. I tried to focus on how I had last seen him, crumbling to the sidewalk like a rag doll. The man that stood in front of me now was anything but a rag doll. He was a good foot taller than me yet it wasn't the height that had me unnerved. It was the stance he now bore, as if he was prepared for a fight. Was I a threat? I looked down dumbly at my mussed clothes and dirty sneakers.

His lips formed a hard line and I couldn't stop myself from returning the frown.

"You need to help me." He looked down at my phone on the ground and made strange gesture as if he wanted to reach for it himself. "Pick up your phone. You have to call my brother."

I squinted past the sweat forming a haze over my vision. What was happening? Had I passed out? Was I dying of dehydration on the side of the road somewhere?

"I-I might be dead." I said stupidly. He looked taken back but merely shook his head and took a step towards me. I flinched at the gesture. After all the times I'd wished for him to haunt me just once more, this was too much.

"Hold up your hand." He barked impatiently. My hand moved upward towards him of almost its own accord. He slid his fingers across my skin and I instantly felt chilled. Yet no skin touched my own. I blinked at the non-contact.

He shook his head firmly. "If you were dead, I would be able to touch you. _Feel_ you." Something dark flashed in his gaze and I tried to swallow past the dry dust in my throat.

He nodded at the ground again and my eyes followed his this time. I snatched at my phone suddenly as if it might be beyond my grasp at any moment. The whole moment left me feeling utterly stupid and I wasn't about to accept it. My whole life had seemed to be one freak show after another. I wasn't about to welcome this one with open arms.

I ran headlong back towards that gas station. Pills to swallow, a knife to cut my wrists, a gun! I needed it all now. Anything to end this train wreck before it crashed and left me bloody and bent.

There are some people who can live with anything, no matter the cost to themselves. I am sadly not one of those people. I wish I was, I truly do. But it's just not who I am, when the worst comes at me, I start looking for the nearest exit sign.

Now was one of those times.

My feet couldn't carry me faster. My throat burned. Sweat stun my eyes.

Still in the distance I could hear Dean's voice like a mosquito in my ear. I heard tone and texture but couldn't make out a single word. Maybe I didn't want to. Maybe I couldn't face reality.

Somehow I reached the store. Somewhere in the back of my mind I realized it had been abandoned long ago. Some time later I had a piece of dull glass in my hand I had broken off from the edge of an already busted window in the back.

Pain flashed pleasantly down my wrist as a small trail of blood welled up behind it. Immediately I knew the cut wasn't deep enough. I clenched at the glass harder, ready to end it here and now. Ready to join him in that cold world he'd touched me with.

I repositioned the glass shard at the top of my wrist and with all my might pressed down into my skin.


	3. The Blue Sun

Weakness is a mental flaw. One that's hard to shake. Tough skin is something that's grown over time.

Something I now possess.

But looking back on that day in the abandoned gas station, I know I once didn't.

If only I could've turned away from all that happened next. Part of me still wonders if I'd take that chance. Part of me is still afraid.

Cold seeped through me like ice in my veins running it's course. I blinked but darkness was all I saw. Shouting pierced the black around me and I flinched at the tone. Fear jolted me into conciousness briefly and I caught a glimpse of Dean above me.

I blinked heavily. My face was wet. Was I crying? Dean swan before my eyes.

"Don't you dare die." He scolded, and I found myself frowning inwardly. Shouldn't he want this? My death is his revenge.

The same instant I felt the weight of my body leave me his hands were under me, lifting me up. The pace he set was that of someone with concern. If I could feel pain I'm sure I'd be screaming right about now. I blinked again, my vision going in and out. One second clinging to the shadows, the next filled with Dean.

As my grasp on conciousness came back to me I tried to make sense of how he was touching me.

How had I gotten into his arms, and just where was he taking me?

I finally came around slowly, his face coming into view as if from far away. His green eyes flickered to mine and in them I read the full weight of all the anger he must've felt towards me. His strong jaw was clenched tight and I watched as a muscle ticked in it. I recoiled from the sight but his grip on me only tightened. A shadow of a beard had formed on his face, like somehow where he was happened to be beyond the laws of physics.

Black swallowed me up again but I snapped back into conciousness long enough to realize I hadn't died. Or had I? I tried to flex my hands but they remained motionless. Was I outside my body even now? If so, why couldn't I feel my skin?

I must have muttered something to that effect, because Dean's chest rumbled beneath my ear. I blinked at the reaction. How is it that I could feel Dean but had lost sense of my own skin somewhere along the way?

A second later I was back in my body. Pain flashed all over my flesh and reverberated down my left wrist. Blood still seeped from the wounds but another pair of unfamiliar hands were on me in an instant. I shot my accusing gaze to the figure above me.

"W-who?" Was all I could seem to muster. But the man above me merely shook his head.

"Stay quiet, you've lost a lot of blood. Try not to tire yourself out." His voice calmed me in a way I wasn't ready for. Where was Dean?

"Who is Dean?" The man asked. Had I spoken out loud? Is hands moved over my wrist swiftly and the pain flashed through me over and over, beckoning me into another form of torment.

I grit my teeth against it and tried to focus on the broken plaster of the ceiling above me. The gas station took on the sun from an angle I'd never seen. Dust mingled in the air where I lay, dancing in the rays of light. The usual colors of afternoon bore a strange eerie blue tinge I'd never seen except outside of my body.

Yet the pain in my wrist told me otherwise. I was very much attached to my body. Still somehow my eyes saw outside out it. I blinked against the tears forming.

I tried to reason out how anyone could be out here, on the back roads of Kansas, in the middle of nowhere. How I had ended up being saved when there hadn't been a soul for miles? I felt the strangers hands at my neck briefly, tracing my vein.

And then it was dark. And I dreamed.


	4. The Blue Sun (Part 2)

Blue light washed out the world around me. Instantly I was back on that sidewalk, the one I'd prayed to never see again. Yet somehow it was different. It wasn't quite how I remembered it. A second later I knew why. It wasn't my eyes I was remembering it through.

It was _his._

I blinked down at myself walking towards me and felt startled at the sight. My black hair curled down my shoulders softly and a rare glow lit up my small features. I stammered at the funny beat my heart took on.

I was dressed plainly that day too, black jeans, converse, and a long sleeved gray sweater. I didn't feel special or pretty in any way, it just wasn't one of those days when you left the house feeling better or different in any way.

Yet somehow, someway...I was beautiful.

I had never seen myself this way. It was as if my own gray eyes looked back at me with life. There was a light around me, something I'd rarely ever even felt let alone saw when I'd looked in the mirror.

I shuffled past people on the sidewalk and the closer I got the faster my heart sped up. I found myself yearning to make contact with myself, wanting to reach out and touch the creature I had become.

The one I'd never let myself see. The one I'd never knew existed.

I knew somewhere deep down that this was Dean's memory of the day he was pulled from his body. Yet my mind had a hard time separating itself from his thoughts. I hadn't known he'd seen me coming.

I'd never even considered it.

Still somehow as I inched my way closer through the crowd on the sidewalk each second his eyes never left my face.

Only five feet separated us now and my heavy palms itched to reach out for my own curls, to bury my face in them and inhale.

An instant later we touched, my left arm bumping _her_ shoulder. I felt warm, soft. A spark of electricity surged in the air between us I hadn't quite felt from my point of view before.

It was more than electricity, it was excitement. He/I blinked down at myself and when my eyes met his I felt what he felt, saw what he saw.

And in his eyes, I was everything.

I was beauty and grace, my eyes held his and my lips parted on a sigh at the time I'd done in fear. Yet his eyes moved to them and felt something very different. He had wanted to kiss me.

A second later all was dark.


	5. Everything's About to Change

I drift in agony. I have no idea how long I pretended to be unconscious, but I am now excruciatingly aware of one solid fact: Dean doesn't know it was me who killed him.

And he is holding my hand. The warmth of his fingers trace gently over mine again and again. A nurse enters and adjusts my sheets. Her shoes softly tap from one side of my bed to the other and slowly fade away.

I struggle not to react. How is he holding my hand? How can I feel it? I want to ask him, but how can I face him with this lie on my lips? How can I ever again?

I should've died. But it's never that easy. The bad guy never gets what he wants. Only what he deserves.

After an infinite, endless length of time, I cracked open my eyelids, forcing myself to face what I'd done.

Dean's head snapped up immediately, his face unreadable. "You're awake."

I tried not to flinch at his impatient tone.

"I am." I croaked, my throat dry.

He moved his hands to his jeans and rubs them absent-mindedly up and down his thighs. I tried not to stare. Somehow he is even more handsome than I allowed myself to remember. His green eyes lock on to mine and I force myself not to linger on his features. His straight nose, deep-set gaze and perfect lips all call to my attention.

I strained to sit up and Dean's eyes darkened at the movement. "You should rest."

I ignored his order and pulled myself further up. Besides being sore the only pain I felt was a dull one coming from beneath the bandages on my left wrist. The one I'd tried to open in an attempt to escape.

His eyes followed mine to my arm and he scrubbed a hand over his mouth, hiding a weak smile. "I thought you'd died, for the longest time, thought you were on your way out."

I merely shook my head, not understanding why he would even care.

Dawning came a moment later. "You could touch me." I said lightly. "You thought I was becoming like you. A ghost."

He nodded. His hand reaching across the bed to skim the surface of my skin. We both didn't react for a long moment. I couldn't feel him again, and by the look on his face, he could no longer feel me.

"Why were you following me?" I asked, curious.

He only shook his head. "I need your help. Please."

I fidgeted, trying to understand him. Of all the people he could've reached out to, why me?

"I don't know how you think I can help." It was a statement but he scowled as if it was a question he couldn't answer.

"My brother can, he will know what to do. Just trust me."

I closed my eyes, willing myself to shut off the voices screaming at me to say no. To just run. I plowed through them one by one, shunning them to the back of my mind. Shutting the door on each and every one.

No matter what I did to this man, he deserved more than for me to walk away from him now.

I can do this. I can put aside my splintered soul for a day and make a phone call for him.

I squeezed my eyes tighter.

When I opened them again, I was alone.

When the nurse came to discharge me I tried not to look back at the room behind me, wondering if he was still there, waiting for my answer.

An hour after that I stared at myself in the mirror with cold detachment. An odd smile played on the lips of the woman looking back. I tried to summon the images of myself I saw in my dream, but they were nowhere to be found.

If only I hadn't had that dream. If only I could go back to a time when my best friends dreary dating life was my biggest problem of the day. Back when dreams never plagued me and my nights were filled with the freedom of my soul and clear of conscience.

Now I feared I'd never see days like those again.

I moved away from the mirror and exited the hospital lobby into the dry summer air. I briefly wondered if I was still in Kansas. Yet where I was seemed to be an afterthought. It hadn't mattered before when I'd been knee-deep in my suicide spree. It didn't matter now.

Except, I somehow saw past the next minute of my life. When had that changed?

"Miss! Hey, miss!" A soft hand on my shoulder made me start. I gazed up at the face who had worked over me in the convenience store.

My mouth hung open at the sight of him. He wore a white lab coat and hospital badge. His black hair had the start of gray threaded through it and his dark brown eyes searched mine intently. A smile spread across his face showing a set of perfect teeth except one overlapping canine that gave him an endearing quality.

"I saw your discharge papers and didn't have a chance to stop by after you'd woken up. I wasn't your attending but I did bring you in. Sorry if I kind of chased you down, I just wanted to make sure you were alright."

"Oh, I-uh.. thank-you." I stammered. He shifted a step away from me and I took the advantage and let a deep breath into my lungs. "You were the one that found me then?" I asked softly.

"Yes, I was driving by when I saw you dash around the back side of the old Petro Mart like you had death himself on your heels. By the time I rounded the corner you were out of it."

I narrowed my eyes slightly at him. "So you didn't see what happened to me?"

He looked a bit taken back at the question. "Well, no. I figured you must've tripped and fell. I-" He closed his mouth quickly as if stopping himself from saying something damning.

I nodded and thanked him again for helping me. Thankfully he let me leave without a fight but I sometimes think back to that day and the look in his eyes as I retreated out back into the world.

I glanced at his badge on the way out the door and set his name to memory. Dr. Trevor Pooler. The last person who would ever lay a hand on me and live to tell about it.


End file.
